Ask any restaurateur about Valentine’s Day bookings, and their eyes roll.
The crush of reservations pushes kitchens and servers to the brink. Overlapping bookings can create chaos through the evening. Menu selections typically become depleted. Customers and restaurant staff often find their patience sorely tested.
This year, why not defer going out for a romantic dinner until another, less hectic night? Instead, stay in for an intimate, simple meal with fun wines and tempting desserts. Here are some combinations to try:
Raspberries, Dark Chocolates and Rosé
Raspberry tarts, bittersweet dark chocolate and sparkling rosé wine create a lovely trio. Just add fresh flowers to complete the romantic moment.
Start with an authentic tarte aux framboises from La Gourmandine Bakery’s ( lagourmandinebakery.com). It’s made with a sweet graham cracker-like crust filled with custard and topped with fresh raspberries and powdered sugar.
For classic dark chocolate with a touch more sweetness than other bars, nibble on Perugina Italia Bittersweet Chocolate (70% cacao; available at Pennsylvania Macaroni Company ).
For an easy-drinking rosé, try N.V. Le Cellier Lingot Martin, “Cuvée Suzanne” Pét-Nat, Vin de France ($16.99, Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board selection code No. 82792). The wine comes from Gamay grapes grown on slopes in France’s Savoie region.
Limited skin contact creates its gorgeous salmon pink color, and since the wine was bottled before fermentation was completed, it has subtle, yet tantalizing bubbles of fizz. On the nose, fresh red fruit aromas open to tasty cherry and citrus flavors. Terrific, fresh acidity and pleasant creamy notes add interest. It finishes essentially dry to counter the sweetness in the tart and chocolate. Only 10.5% alcohol by volume. Delicious.
Chocolate Dipped Madeleines, Milk Choclolate and Sauturnes
For another delicious trio, try La Gourmandine Bakery’s chocolate-dipped Madeleine sweet biscuits with Valrhona “Dulcey” (35% cocoa butter, available at Mon Aimee Chocolat in the Strip District, monaimeechocolat.com).
The light, spongy Madeleine complements the sweet, caramel flavors of the chocolate. Then, add a sweet, well-balanced white wine from Bordeaux, France.
The delightful 2018 Château de Suduiraut, “Lions de Suduiraut,” Sauternes, France ($16.99, PLCB No. 22187), a “second wine” from Bordeaux’s famed Château de Suduiraut, provides a lovely companion wine.
The Lions de Suduiraut receives the same painstaking attention to quality production as the famous first wine. Fermentation occurs with hand-harvested grapes which have been dried out and shriveled by beneficial Botrytis cinerea molds. The resulting wine offers marvelous honey and ripe apricot aromas and flavors, albeit with less concentration than the first wine. Delicious, fresh acidity adds balance through the sweet finish.
Framboise, Marcona Almond Chocolate and Macarons
Gaby et Jules Pâtisseries et Macarons (gabyetjules.com) in Squirrel Hill and East Liberty offers a dazzling assortment of Valentine Day’s macaron cookies. Try the raspberry, strawberry, and chocolate flavors in the bright-red gift book.
Pair the sweet, creamy macrons with Lux Artisan Chocolates, Marcona Almond and Milk Chocolate Bar (available at Mon Aimee Chocolat and at Ka-Fair Coffee and Bakery in Morningside or online at luxartisanchocolates.com). The modestly sweet milk chocolate and crunchy almonds are irresistible.
For the beverage, try Lindemans Framboise Raspberry Lambic Beer from Belgium available in 750-milliliter bottles at bottle shops throughout the region. Like a fine, authentic wine, this lambic beer is fermented with wild yeasts from the air around the brewery. The resulting beer has tart, fresh berry aromas and flavors with terrific freshness, a touch of sweetness and only around 3% alcohol by volume.
Marquise, Dark Chocolate and L.B.V. Port
Finally, try decadent chocolate desserts such as La Gourmandine’s Marquise — chocolate mousse with layers of crème brûlée, vanilla sponge cake and crunchy caramel — or Gaby et Jules’ royale, crafted with chocolate Genoise, chocolate mousse and chocolate glaze flecked with precious gold leaf.
Both go well with Maître Chocolatier François Pralus’ Ghana Forastero (75% cacao dark chocolate; available from Mon Aimee Chocolat in the Strip District), a dark chocolate with a hint of pleasant bitterness on the finish.
Pair these chocolate delicacies with the 2016 Cockburn’s, Late Bottled Vintage Porto, Portugal ($22.99, PLCB No. 8269).
As with Cockburn’s acclaimed vintage port wines, the grapes for this wine are picked from Quinta dos Canais, the same superior vineyard. After the wine ferments initially, the producer adds neutral grape spirits while the wine retains natural sugars.
This gives the final wine a touch of sweetness and elevated alcohol by volume of typically 19.5%.
The wine is then aged in large woodven vats for about 20 months, whereupon Cockburn’s decided against declaring a formal “vintage” port. So, the wine continues aging and develops in the wooden vats for another four to six years. Cockburn’s decided the wine had developed well enough to merit a “late bottled vintage port” or LBV.
A well-made LBV offers a glimpse of the complexity and pleasure provided by vintage ports, but at a fraction of the cost. And, unlike those wines, LBVs can be enjoyed without additional cellar aging and often without decanting. The wine adds an ambrosia of ripe red fruits and fresh acidity that is a delightful partner with decadent desserts and bitter dark chocolate.
Cheers!!